Only one in six councils in England have installed on-street EV charge points, an investigation has revealed.
Research by the AA also found a ‘worrying’ lack of cooperation between some district and county councils, who both believe it is the other one's responsibility to install on-street charging.
The AA has accused some councils of using a ‘loophole’ in the On-Street Residential Charging Scheme (ORCS) grant by using the funding to install charge infrastructure in town centre car parks rather than in residential areas.
AA president Edmund King said: ‘While many councils already have charge points, most of these are either in town centre car parks, or park and ride locations. While this is fine and must continue to grow, but we still need to provide confidence to drivers without dedicated off-street parking that they can charge at home.
‘The ORCS grant is specifically designed to help local authorities overcome the challenge of on-street residential parking and charging, however, too many councils see this as a way of bolstering their town centre charging infrastructure. This goes against the spirit of the grant.’
However, the research did find at least 32 councils will install their first on-street changes before the end of 2021.
This article first appeared on localgov.co.uk.
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